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Mock trial tackles "'Twas the night before Christmas" ownership

'Tis the week before Christmas and they wanted to show, who wrote the poem that everyone knows. In a courtroom in Troy (New York) that was heavily packed, there was a make-believe trial, with plenty of facts.

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Mock trial tackles "'Twas the night before Christmas" ownership

'Tis the week before Christmas and they wanted to show, who wrote the poem that everyone knows. In a courtroom in Troy (New York) that was heavily packed, there was a make-believe trial, with plenty of facts.

(WNYT) 'Tis the week before Christmas and they wanted to show, who wrote the poem that everyone knows. In a courtroom in Troy (New York) that was heavily packed, there was a make-believe trial, with plenty of facts.

And because authorship has been disputed for a very long while, they figured to resolve things with a make-believe trial.

There were lawyers, and plaintiffs, and an honorable judge; there were spectators who filled the courtroom until no one could budge.

And to determine the author of a poem that everyone has read, they called on witnesses brought back from the dead.

No one disputes that "A Visit from St. Nicholas" -- otherwise known as "Twas the Night Before Christmas" -- was first published in the Troy Sentinel Newspaper on December 23, 1823.